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American-style buttermilk biscuits

American biscuits are basically scones without sugar. As such, you can smother them with jam without any guilt. They also go beautifully with fresh carved ham, chunks of fried chicken, sausage, fresh fruit and slatherings of butter.

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Ingredients
Makes: 12 biscuits

250g plain flour

4 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons cold butter

2 tablespoons vegetable fat (e.g. Trex®)

230ml chilled buttermilk (see tip)

50g butter, melted (optional)

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MethodPrep:30min › Cook:15min › Ready in:45min

Preheat the oven to 220 C / Gas 7 (try to avoid using a fan oven for this recipe). Line a baking tray with baking parchment.

Combine dry ingredients in a large bowl. Rub in butter and vegetable fat until you end up with a crumb-like texture. Do this quickly to avoid melting the butter. Create a well in the centre and add in chilled buttermilk. Mix lightly until mixture is just moist throughout. Dust hands with flour and form a ball.

Turn the ball out onto a floured work surface and roll out to a thickness of 2cm. Flour a biscuit cutter (4cm for small biscuits or 8cm for larger biscuits) and cut out biscuits. Transfer carefully to lined baking tray. Bring the remaining dough together and roll out again, cutting out more biscuits until the mixture is used up.

Bake in the preheated oven for 10 to 15 minutes until risen and golden brown. If you wish, you can brush with melted butter once they come out of the oven. Serve warm or allow to cool on a wire rack before serving.

Tip

Biscuits taste much better when freshly baked and warm. You can freeze the dough cut-outs you are not going to use, and simply increase your cooking time when you do want to bake them (add 3 to 5 minutes, and continue to cook if necessary). Americans typically cut the biscuit in half and add butter and jam, but they taste great plain as well. Serve with rashers of streaky bacon, hash browns and some fruit salad.

Substitutions

Instead of 230ml buttermilk you can use chilled or natural yoghurt thinned with whole milk.

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Reviews & ratingsAverage global rating:

(3)

Reviews in English (3)

Wanted to recreate my favourite American breakfast in the UK and this recipe was perfect. Found all the ingredients easily in my local supermarket. TREX was next to the butter in the refrigerators and baking soda is the same as bicarbonate of soda. Used the kenwood K beater to rub the fats into the flour then just added the buttermilk. Buttered and served with Oscar Mayer bacon yum!
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08 Mar 2015

Very easy, soft, fluffy scones, delicious! Being English, I had to add two tablespoons of sugar, and use only butter, but the recipe works really well and is so quick to make. I can highly recommend it.
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30 Mar 2014